Welcome back, we're exploring
the two great commandments
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that Jesus explains
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and declaresin
Matthew, Chapter 22.
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Ranko, you've, you've helped
us understand a little bit
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but I sense some more here.
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And I also sense
this is personal.
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Yeah, Glenn, I hope
that the viewers will notice
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that I'm very
charismatic about this
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in talking bout this passage
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because when I talk
about my previous life,
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um, I had hard
time in loving people
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and relating to
people and actually,
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God used this passage
to change my own life.
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That's why this passage
is so much important to me
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and I would like share
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actually in dealing with
this text I want to share
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with the viewers how
God changed my own life.
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Glenn, you know, when
we talked to department
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usually I'm perceived by
students to be a loving teacher
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Actually, it happened
about thirty years ago
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they would not have
such opinion about me.
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I believe that God
can change everybody,
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God changed me
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and dear viewers, I
just want to tell you
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if God was able to change
me God can also change you.
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All right, so
we've explored the fact
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that these two commandments
are very much connected.
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So Glenn, the first commandment,
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I don't want now to
talk too much about others,
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because evidently Christians,
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they try to have that
right relationships with God
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they're
struggling, but we can notice
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and I believe that the
viewers will agree with me
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that the problem that we have
in our lives is how generally
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to relate to other people.
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These are struggles of all us.
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How can I love my enemy?
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How can I do the people
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when they don't
treat me justly etcetera?
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How to practice it?
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So let's try to see
what we have in the text.
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Ranko, you're implying that
we even though we're convert,
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even though we're baptized
there're still some struggles.
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There are strugglers
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and genuine Christians
are struggling with this.
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Wherever I go
people are asking me
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many, many
questions about how to apply,
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how to put in--
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Scripture's realistic here.
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Yes, so Glenn, let's go
to the second commandment,
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"you shall love your
neighbor as yourself."
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By the way if we go to the book,
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to the, to James,
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James, Chapter 2, verse 8.
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He calls, "you shall love
your neighbor as yourself,
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as the royal commandment."
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By the way, do you
know, that several times
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in the New Testament
this royal commandment,
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"you shall love your
neighbor as yourself"
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is repeated in New Testament.
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Never the first four, only this.
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Evidently this is what
people are struggling about.
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So let's go to that.
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Glenn, you need now to help me.
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You shall love your
neighbor as yourself.
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How many parts do you
have in this commandment?
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I don't want to
put you on the spot.
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It's 3 parts.
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Which are the 3 parts?
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The first part
is the imperative.
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I don't like to use
the expression, command.
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This is not command,
imperative, you shall love.
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The next one, the question is,
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whom, whom shall I love?
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The answer is, your neighbor
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and the third part
is how shall I love?
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And the answer is,
as you love yourself,
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and I know that
many aspects of this,
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what we just
presented, is misunderstood.
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So let's go piece by piece.
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The first one
is, you shall love.
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You see, the
word you shall love,
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that Jesus employed here
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is found here in
the gospel of Matthew.
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It's actually the word agapao,
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from which the word agape comes.
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This word is, refers to the love
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which is
actually of divine origin,
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unknown to ancient Greeks.
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It's specifically
the biblical concept,
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you see that love, agape love,
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that only God possesses.
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We're not born with that love,
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it's actually imparted to
us as a,as a gift from God.
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Okay these--
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Ranko, if I, if I might
just intrude here for a moment.
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Please, please.
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I think many times people
feel that love is a feeling.
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But I don't feel
like loving them.
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This is not
about, about feeling,
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you see, this is
the gift from God.
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This love is all inclusive.
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You remember when
we talked in the Sermon
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on the Mount is we have
to love all people as God,
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thus we have to
be perfect as God.
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Because He gives His rain,
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He gives His sun
to both good and evil.
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It includes all people.
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Number one, it's all inclusive.
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Second, it's unconditional.
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I love this love agape
not because people love me
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but so many times
despite the fact they love me.
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When I was a young
person an idea came to my mind.
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I heard something very similar
and it brought me to think.
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This love is like a
rose, flower, okay, a rose.
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You know, you take
rose from the bush,
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you put to your nostrils,
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boy, such a very nice aroma.
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Then you take that rose,
put it down on the ground,
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you trample, put in the
dust, do what ever you want.
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Take that rose, put
back to your nostrils,
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it's still the same aroma.
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This is what this
love is all about.
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This is what Jesus did.
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He loved His
disciples whether they were good
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or sometimes they
struggle with issues.
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He loved even
Jerusalem that rejected Him.
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He cried over
Jerusalem, even on the cross
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when He was being crucified.
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"Father, forgive them
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because they don't
know what they do."
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This is the first one.
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But the second one also provide
clarification to the first one.
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Who are those
that we are to love?
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You shall love it.
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The answer is, your neighbor.
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Actually, the
Greek word Plesion,
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that is used, let
me translate in English
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as the word neighbor
is a correct translation.
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In my language the word,
believes me, means neighbor.
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But what is the meaning
of the word neighbor, Glenn?
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It's old English.
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What is the
meaning of neig--neighhbor?
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We usually think of
the one who's near by.
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Somebody who's...
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This is exactly
what Jesus taught.
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You see, it's very
easy to me to stand here
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in front of camera
and say to our viewers,
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I love you.
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It's very easy to love
people who are faraway from me,
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I don't know them.
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And so many times I hear
stories about the mission field
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People are hungry,
people are suffering.
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can be so, you know,
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caught with my
emotions and take my wallet
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and take money to
send to the mission field.
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But when I'm
here in the classroom,
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when I see my neighbor,
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the student who's there in there
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who's suffering
financially, then I calculate,
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he doesn't know to deal
with the money, etcetera.
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its much easier in our lives
to love people who are faraway
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than those who
are our neighbors.
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Glenn, who's
your first neighbor?
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Right in your own home.
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Your wife, next one, children.
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Do you know that it is
the most difficult thing
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to love my wife and my children?
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And it might be sometimes
difficult for them to love us.
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When we go to restaurant
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and how easy to offer the chair
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to another person, etcetera,
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but when my wife
comes, how do I treat her?
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I remember so many times
and I know that God forgave me.
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I try, I was always patience
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with young people,
trying to help them.
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When they ask me question
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I will sit, let
me explain to you
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and then I come home, I'm tired
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and my own children
ask me something question,
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please leave me
alone, I'm tired.
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You know, who's
next my neighbor?
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My neighbor,
next house they are.
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I'm coming from
the part of the world
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where neighbors are always
fighting against each other.
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She can came to
my side, you know.
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Who's next of my neighbor?
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The people that
are working there.
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When you come for the first time
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to your office,
everybody is nice.
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You love everybody,
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but when you become
familiar with people,
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when they're close to them,
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when they're
really your neighbors.
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That's the test.
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This is the test of my love.
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I know, my wife watch
me preaching about this
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and then I would,
I would sit in my car
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there in PMCA on
campus of Andrews University.
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I'm going to the
church, Sabbath morning,
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I'm driving my car
and suddenly front of me
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there's that, that
shiny car flip flop me
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cut the way, I almost hit there,
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you know, that car
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and there is
something, that anger within me.
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You know, students from Andrews
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driving there without thinking
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and my wife said, keep in mind
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at that this moment
he is very close to you,
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he's your neighbor
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And suddenly how
my attitude changes.
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Yes.
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My neighbor.
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Actually, I remember when
I preachedthere in Chicago
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I preached about that
and I try to tell people,
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you see, it's very
hard to love our neighbors
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But if you want to love people,
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you have to make
them your neighbors.
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It makes sense?
This is the paradox.
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Do you remember the
parable of the prodigal son?
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His brother came there
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he didn't want
to enter the house
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but the father says,
come, see your brother.
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If you see his repentance
he will become your neighbor,
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very close to you
and then you love him,
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your opinion will
change, change about you.
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I remember I preached in Chicago
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and that one
person wrote to me a note
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and he said, we
got the new neighbor,
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he said and I came out,
he was there in his yard.
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I wave hands, he did not react.
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It happened several days.
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He didn't want to
even, even to see me.
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want to make a long story short.
00:09:58.36\00:10:00.46
He said, after two months
I start to hate that person.
00:10:00.50\00:10:05.07
I couldn't stand him
any more and my wife said,
00:10:05.10\00:10:07.97
hey, our neighbor has birthday,
00:10:08.00\00:10:09.97
I prepare cake,
let's go to visit them.
00:10:10.01\00:10:11.97
No, I didn't
want to go, he said.
00:10:12.01\00:10:14.58
My wife went with the
cake and she came back
00:10:14.61\00:10:17.31
and I ask in cynical way,
so what about our neighbor?
00:10:17.35\00:10:20.68
She said, I love them.
00:10:20.72\00:10:22.05
Oh, really? She
said, how can you--
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why wouldn't you
love a blind person
00:10:24.15\00:10:27.86
who's such a
nice person toward us?
00:10:27.89\00:10:30.96
He said, then I
realized, that person was blind.
00:10:30.99\00:10:35.40
I was judging that
person and grudge against him
00:10:35.43\00:10:39.53
but then my wife make
him really our neighbors,
00:10:39.57\00:10:42.50
that she saw his situation.
00:10:42.54\00:10:44.51
Our relationships changed.
00:10:44.54\00:10:46.68
Number 3, then how
to love your neighbor?
00:10:46.71\00:10:49.88
Jesus said, as
you love yourself.
00:10:49.91\00:10:53.28
Glenn, I am not
always happy of my accent.
00:10:53.31\00:10:56.82
I'm not happy of
the color of my voice
00:10:56.85\00:11:00.16
I have very strange voice.
00:11:00.19\00:11:01.52
I'm not happy always
with regard to my actions,
00:11:01.56\00:11:04.76
how I behave.
00:11:04.79\00:11:06.29
Every evening, I pray to God
00:11:06.33\00:11:07.96
to forgive me the
way how I treated people.
00:11:08.00\00:11:10.53
I'm not happy always with myself
00:11:10.57\00:11:13.00
but despite the fact
that I'm not happy how I look
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how I talk, how I
behave, I still love myself
00:11:16.44\00:11:20.48
and want other
people to respect me.
00:11:20.51\00:11:23.24
Jesus said, this is the way
00:11:23.28\00:11:25.71
how you should
love your neighbor.
00:11:25.75\00:11:28.38
You're not always happy
how your neighbor look like.
00:11:28.42\00:11:32.02
You're not always happy
how your neighbor behaves.
00:11:32.05\00:11:36.39
You're not always
happy with many things
00:11:36.42\00:11:38.63
with regard to your
neighbor, but in the same way
00:11:38.66\00:11:41.46
that you're not
happy with yourself,
00:11:41.50\00:11:43.73
you still love yourself,
00:11:43.77\00:11:45.67
so you should
love also your neighbor
00:11:45.70\00:11:48.64
even though you're
not always happywith him.
00:11:48.67\00:11:52.11
This is what Jesus tried to--
00:11:52.14\00:11:53.78
We shouldn't think
that what He's telling about
00:11:53.81\00:11:55.38
here is some psychological
thing of self affirmation.
00:11:55.41\00:11:58.68
He's saying, look you
naturally love yourself.
00:11:58.71\00:12:00.78
It's genuine.
00:12:00.82\00:12:02.15
Extend that to others.
00:12:02.18\00:12:03.52
You remember, I was
forgiven ten thousand dollars
00:12:03.55\00:12:09.42
How not to love other
people who owe me little?
00:12:09.46\00:12:15.66
I want, I want to make
an appeal to our viewers.
00:12:15.70\00:12:19.70
Some of you are good Christians
00:12:19.73\00:12:21.60
belonging to that Christian
community to your church.
00:12:21.64\00:12:24.31
Some of you're struggling
with your relationships
00:12:24.34\00:12:28.21
with your own family,
00:12:28.24\00:12:29.58
different people you're
meeting on the daily base.
00:12:29.61\00:12:32.78
Our struggle is
how to love people.
00:12:32.81\00:12:35.48
We love because God loved us
00:12:35.52\00:12:38.82
and can give us strength
00:12:38.85\00:12:40.29
to love other
people if he loved us.
00:12:40.32\00:12:42.82